Whatever Price I'll Have To Pay
by Mondhase
Summary: AU. Sequel to "Whatever It Is You Are Called Upon To Do". Ward is working as a double agent for Maria Hill, trying to take Hydra down from the inside, while doing his best to protect his friends and his own humanity in the process.
1. Chapter 1

**A/N:** Sequel to my story "Whatever It Is You Are Called Upon To Do", taking an alternative direction from the final story arc of season 1, starting with "Providence". Ward is still a double agent (or is that a triple agent now?) working for Hydra on Maria Hill's orders, trying to take it down from the inside, while doing his best to protect his friends and his own humanity in the process.

* * *

**Whatever Price I'll Have To Pay**

**Chapter 1**

You couldn't kill Hydra by cutting off its head, that much Ward had known from the beginning. No, you had to set it on fire and burn it to the ground to make sure that every part of it would be completely destroyed, but if he was being honest, the specialist had not expected the end of the evil organisation to be quite so literal.

As he was making his way through the burning building, on his way to face the man who had set all of this in motion, even if involuntarily, Agent Ward had no illusions about the outcome of this confrontation. However, as long as he managed to kill John Garrett – for Skye, for Fitz, and for himself – he didn't care that he was going to die with him.

He would never leave this building again, wouldn't get another chance to see his old team, his former friends, and apologise to them, nor see the results of everything he had done over the past few months to bring Hydra down for good. But all of that was okay, as he knew that he didn't deserve any of it anyway.

He had killed too many people, too many good agents, to get out of this alive. He had put his own team, those who had trusted him unconditionally, through hell, and even though they would soon know the truth and might even find it within themselves to forgive him, he never would. He had sacrificed all of himself to destroy Hydra, his reputation, his honour, his friends and even the woman he loved, it was only fitting that he sacrificed his life now as well.

Maybe he had helped to create a new world, a better one even, but he sure as hell didn't belong in it anymore, because he knew he was no better than the people he had been fighting all this time.

**To be continued…**


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N:** Most of this will be very familiar, with the dialogue taken directly from the show, but I think that Ward's POV puts a new perspective to what happened, as he tries to balance his loyalties.

* * *

**Chapter 2 **

Even now as his fight against Hydra was almost over and Ward was on his way to Garrett, there was a list of numbers, names and faces running through his head, that was haunting him every day, reminding him of how high the price for this victory had been.

Ever since Garrett had one of his own men killed for asking the wrong questions, after Ward had tipped him off about that, the specialist had been keeping count of all the people he had killed, or for whose deaths he had been responsible in the name of Hydra, either still as a loyal follower or to maintain his cover.

_One._ Dan Monroe, a loyal SHIELD agent and father to a six year old son, who had made the mistake of trusting him to advise him on how to handle his suspicions about Garrett. He hadn't meant for anything to happen to the agent, when he had told his former S.O. about his call, but he might as well have pulled the trigger himself.

_Two. Three._ Two more of Garrett's agents apparently killed on the hunt for Ian Quinn, but Ward had known better. He wasn't sure if the two men had already had suspicions about their boss before the death of their team member, but as the 'Clairvoyant' had ordered the hit on them shortly after that, it was obvious the incidents were connected, meaning that those were two more deaths that Ward was at least in part responsible for.

It didn't matter that by that time he had already been working for Maria Hill, trying to take down Hydra, others were still paying the price for his mistakes.

_Four. _Thomas Nash, the fake Clairvoyant, whom he had shot to keep the real identity of the man behind the Centipede project a secret.

_Five. Six. Seven._ The two guards and Victoria Hand as they had been heading for the Fridge to lock up Garrett.

_Eight. Nine._ The two SHIELD agents in the building's elevator, who had only broken protocol and let them inside to save their lives a few moments earlier.

And even though they had taken out the rest of the facility with a potent sleeping gas, Ward knew that raiding the Fridge itself and freeing all the prisoners had probably caused more collateral damage than everything else he had done combined. They had freed murderers and super-powered psychopaths, while putting the most dangerous weapons on the planet into the hands of the biggest sociopath of them all, John Garrett.

He had even shown him where Coulson had locked up the gravitonium, something his former S.O. would have never found on his own, but while he had been worried about the consequences of that action, it had been the only way to make sure to get Ian Quinn back in the game after Garrett had stopped posing as the Clairvoyant. And if he had wanted to take Hydra down, he had needed all the players out on the field again.

Ward was just glad that when he had temporarily rejoined his team at the Providence base, he hadn't been forced to add any of their names to his list. To see their reactions after his cover had been blown, and having to force Skye at gunpoint to decrypt the hard drive containing the team's research had been terrible enough, but he wasn't sure if he would have been able to sacrifice one of them at that point to keep them believing he was Hydra.

He had even gone back to treat Coulson's gunshot wound to the arm, to make sure the agent didn't bleed out, endangering his cover in the process, but looking back, Ward wasn't sure if he would make that same decision again. Not if it meant putting his mission at risk for one man, no matter how much he cared about him.

Even back then he had known that his attachment to his old team had been holding him back, and so a part of him had actually thought that things would become easier once his betrayal had come out and he had left the secret base and his friends behind, stealing the Bus in the process. He had thought that he would be able to focus more on further infiltrating Hydra, but he hadn't anticipated how persistent Coulson and the others would be.

Not only had they managed to find the files on the original Deathlok project in one of Cybertek's offices, they had also tracked them to Havana, found the old SHIELD base they had been using there and had even located the plane.

Not that that last part had done the team any good, but it had thrown another wrench in Ward's plan to keep his friends out of harm's way for as long as he had to appear loyal to Hydra.

When Garrett had spotted Fitz and Simmons surveilling the Bus, the specialist had initially hoped that he would deem the two scientists too valuable to be harmed, but when Fitz had used a handheld EMP device against the older agent, almost killing him, he had instantly known that all bets would be off.

"Put down Fitz and Simmons!" That order had sent a sharp feeling of dread running up Ward's spine, leaving him breathless for a moment.

_Ten. Eleven. _

Despite his conviction to do whatever it took to remain Garrett's loyal right hand man, every fibre of him had protested against the mere idea of hurting the two innocent scientists.

"What? No, there's plenty of time. I won't leave you," he had argued, his expression probably betraying his reluctance.

"And I'm telling you to cross them off for me. It's not a weakness, is it?" Garrett's voice had been weak, but decisive, leaving no room for an objection.

"No." And so the specialist had stood back up and followed his two former team mates down into the lower parts of the Bus, where they had obviously just managed to escape the Hydra agents that had been supposed to guard them.

They had tried to run away from him, but the plane had only so many hiding places and so they had finally locked themselves into a med pod like the one Skye had been lying in after getting shot.

The association alone had made his stomach clench painfully, but neither of the two scientists had seemed to be aware of their friend almost dying in a place like this as they, or at least Fitz, had tried to plead with him to abandon his loyalty to Hydra and help them instead.

"Ward, please, I need to understand."

How much he had wished that he could have told him the truth, but no one had been allowed to know, and even if Ward had wanted to tell him, there hadn't been enough time, as he had been too busy trying to find a way to save the two young agents' lives.

He had known that it would be only a matter of minutes, or maybe just seconds, until more Hydra agents would find them and they would have been more than happy to finish the job if he hadn't by then. No matter what, there had been no way that Fitz and Simmons could have been save anywhere on the Bus, and this feeling of helplessness, along with the fact that Garrett had called them Ward's weakness, had brought back the memories from ten years ago, when he had been accepted into the academy and Garrett had ordered him to shoot his dog Buddy, just to make sure he would never get attached to anyone or anything ever again.

Back then, he had actually considered killing him for a moment, but ultimately hadn't done it and had instead fired a shot into the air to get the loyal animal to run off in an attempt to save his life. However, it had been a futile attempt, as Garrett had used his rifle to finish the job himself, reminding Ward that no matter what, his orders would always be carried out.

So, when he had looked at Fitz and Simmons, who had been staring back at him through the window in the door with fear in their eyes, he had known that the only way to save their lives, the only remote chance that they could survive, was to get them as far away from his boss as possible.

"You need to accept the truth, Fitz, he doesn't care about us, about anything." Simmons had always been brilliant, in fact one of the brightest people he had ever met, but just this once she had been so incredibly wrong and Ward had wanted nothing more than to tell her the truth. But he hadn't. Even as Fitz had continued to defend him, he had never let his Hydra appearance waver, even though deep inside he had already been begging them for forgiveness for what he had been about to do.

"I know that you're a good person, Ward, and you can choose right now to be good. It's a choice," Fitz had told him, obviously still not able to believe that the man he had considered to be one of his best friends had been a traitor all along. But it had been to no avail.

"I got my orders," Ward had replied stoically and when they had still refused to open the door, as he had known they would, he had stepped over to the control panel, activating the plane's unloading protocols, just as he had started to hear the door from the lab being forced open by the Hydra agents who had been following the scientists earlier.

He had tried not to listen to Fitz and Simmons's shouts, begging for him to stop, but even though he had known that he had been giving them their best chance by dropping the pod into the ocean, given the plane's low speed and altitude, he had still felt like he had been about to murder two of the people most important to him.

_Ten. Eleven._

Two more deaths on his conscience.

After it had been done and he had sent the other Hydra agents away again, Ward had taken out his phone to send a short text message to a number Agent Hill had given him months earlier, with the specific instruction only to call in an absolute emergency and with the warning that the number would go dark after that to avoid being traced back to SHIELD.

He hadn't even been sure if there had still been someone on the other end, as most of the organisation had fallen apart by then, but it had been the only option he had had left. The message hadn't been long, just the coordinates where he had dropped the pod and three words.

"Underwater. Send help!"

**To be continued…**


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3**

In the end, all of it had been worth it.

Or at least it hadn't been in vain.

All the pain he'd caused, the lives he'd taken, all of that had led him here to this moment, and with the knowledge that Hydra was falling to pieces around him, Ward found that for the first time in years, his steps were easy, an enormous burden having fallen off his shoulders.

There would be no more betrayal, no more innocent lives lost because of him, and the only thing left for him to do now was to take care of John Garrett to finish this once and for all. Then his mission would finally be over and Ward hoped that maybe, just maybe, he could find some peace in the end after all the horrible things he had seen and that he had done to get here.

A soft humourless chuckle escaped his lips, before he silently muttered one of Garrett's favourite lines to himself, the phrase bringing back memories of the one time he had thought he would never hear it again.

"_If the job was easy…"_

* * *

"If the job was easy-"

These were John Garrett's last words before the GH325 Raina had just injected him with took effect and in a way even his final words, because a few seconds later, the man Ward had known all these years was gone, replaced by an even more dangerous and definitely far crazier version of himself.

To see his former S.O. talk about 'feeling the universe' and draw the same strange symbols Ward had seen all those months ago in that building in Belarus wasn't exactly very reassuring to the specialist, but it wasn't until Garrett stabbed a general of the US military with his own rip, that he realised how far gone he really was.

To make matters worse, it wasn't long afterwards that Coulson and the team showed up on their doorstep once again, suggesting that they had found a way to track the Bus, rendering it useless as an escape vehicle, no matter how much Ward wanted to keep it.

Even Ian Quinn and Raina tried to jump ship at that point, realising that with SHIELD attacking the facility and their biggest ally losing his mind – or being 'connected', as Raina put it – it was probably best to get out of the heat. The only flaw in their plan was, however, that Ward wasn't willing to just let them slip away that easily, because as far as he was concerned, their cooperation wasn't over just yet.

The specialist made it very clear to Quinn, that if wanted to continue his very lucrative partnership with Hydra, he would have to help him make sure that Garrett didn't confront SHIELD just when he was the most vulnerable, despite his new incredible physical strength.

He had to admit that Raina's talk about Skye's true nature was kind of intriguing, but in the end his need to keep her safe prevailed and Ward somehow managed to convince his C.O. to leave the Cybertek facility and only let Deathlok stay behind to slow down Coulson and his team, hoping that they would figure out the true nature of the 'Incentives Program' and shut it down, before any of them were hurt.

But saving John Garrett was only the beginning.

Ward had always known that he was his ticket into Hydra, and even though his own loyalty was still undisputed at this point, Garrett's contacts, established over the span of more than two decades, made him absolutely indispensable if he wanted to get access to the higher levels of the organisation.

As that would require his former S.O. not being completely nuts, however, Ward brought them to one of the many safe houses Garrett had set up for himself over the years, once he had gotten both of them out of Coulson's reach, so they could lie low there for a while. At least he didn't have to worry about any other remaining SHIELD agents catching up with them there, and while Garrett kept obsessing about his sudden new insight into the world, and spent most of his time drawing more symbols on all the walls, Ward was still trying his best to get him back on track and stir him towards Hydra once more.

One day, after they had already been at the house for almost two weeks, he was watching his boss in silence for a while, both confused and fascinated by his diligence at scraping the odd markings into the wall of the living room after having removed all the furniture from the room without so much as breaking a sweat.

Garrett was using a knife this time, instead of the nail he had used on the glass door on the Bus, but Ward still didn't understand why he wasn't just using a pen. He had already offered him one, but Garrett had refused, arguing that there was also a physical aspect to the symbols instead of just a visual one, something he had obviously been surprised Ward hadn't realised immediately.

When there was no sign of him being done anytime soon, the specialist finally addressed his former S.O., trying his best to keep his impatience out of his voice.

"John, I know that this work is important to you, but don't you think it's time that we get back out there? We're still a part of Hydra, and even though I get that you've never really been a true believer, I don't think that we should abandon the cause now. Being a part of Hydra has worked out great for both of us so far-"

"Symbiotic, really," Garrett interrupted him, causing Ward to shut his eyes for a moment and take a deep breath, as he was trying not to let his frustration show.

"Yes, exactly, but hiding away here like some fugitives, that's not very symbiotic, is it? After you were healed, you said that it was now time for me to decide what I want; that you would see that I get it. And what I want is to get out of this hole and do something useful again. You said what Hydra is trying to achieve isn't just a coup, it's an uprising, and I want to be a part of that."

Garrett was still facing the wall when he finished his plea, but his hand was still for what felt like the first time in days, giving Ward hope that he wasn't a completely lost cause.

"You're right, son. You helped me, you did everything I ever asked of you and I wouldn't even be alive if it weren't for you." The older agent turned around at this point, looking at Ward with a more focused expression than he had seen in ages. "What I'm doing here, the things I can see now, all of that is so much bigger than Hydra, but it's all connected. It doesn't matter which path we follow, we're all working towards the same goal now."

"And what goal is that?" Ward asked, even though he wasn't completely sure if he really wanted to know the answer.

"A new world, of course."

**To be continued…**


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter 4**

To say that Hydra was interested in integrating Garrett back into their ranks would have been an understatement. The organisation had always been focused on scientific progress, and to see the results of a miracle drug of alien origin was more than enough incentive for them to welcome the agent back with open arms, despite his plans for an army of easily controlled super soldiers having been destroyed by Coulson and his team.

Garrett donated some of his blood for analysis and agreed to a few tests, with Ward always by his side to make sure that he wouldn't end up as one of Hydra's many science projects.

Despite the specialist's initial concerns that too much encouragement might somehow cause Garrett's mental condition to deteriorate even further, it only took a few days for him to realise that the new environment at one of Hydra's main bases actually seemed to be having the exact opposite effect on him. His boss was becoming more focused again, and while there were still times when he locked himself in his office, scratching the strange symbols into glass board after glass board that were provided for him, the rest of the time Garrett was almost back to his old self, intent on helping Hydra finally achieve the goal they had been working towards for so long.

To control the world.

And while Garrett slowly reintegrated himself into the organisation, Ward was right beside him every step of the way, his loyal right-hand man, making himself familiar with Hydra's infrastructure, resources and projects, biding his time until the right moment, until he had gathered enough intel to finally bring his mission to an end.

When Maria Hill had first asked him to infiltrate Hydra, the plan had been to find out their agenda and to expose all their agents within SHIELD, to free the agency of the corruption, but of course when 'Project Insight' had turned out to be a mass-murdering plan for world domination that had only barely been stopped by Captain America, Natasha Romanoff, Director Fury and Agent Hill herself, everything had changed.

Even while SHIELD had still been intact, Ward had only ever had contact with Hill once, aside from his briefing before joining Coulson's team, to ask her on how to proceed when they had been getting closer to revealing the Clairvoyant's true identity. She had ordered him to do everything in his power to prevent that from happening, to maintain Garrett's cover under all circumstances, finally leading to him shooting Thomas Nash instead, just as Garrett had planned for him to do.

Except from that one time, he had never tried to reach out to Director Fury's second-in-command, knowing that there had been Hydra agents everywhere and every contact between them could have put his mission at risk.

Now that SHIELD was gone, he wasn't even sure if there was still anyone left to reach out to. Sure, Maria Hill had given him the order to go undercover in the first place, but after she had gone to work for Tony Stark, he wasn't sure if she would still have his back if he needed her to. Not to mention the fact that she had a small army of agents from pretty much every agency out there following her around, surveilling her every move.

Ward knew that Coulson had started to rebuilt SHIELD, after having failed to track down him and Garrett, but of course contacting him wasn't an option, either, at least not until the final moment when he had gotten all the pieces in place and was ready to take Hydra down. Until then he was on his own, making his own calls, with nobody to answer to except his own conscience.

A conscience that at one point started taking on a very familiar form as he once again found himself torn between following his morals and what he felt was needed to achieve his mission.

* * *

Ward and a small team of Hydra agents had been ordered to break into a military research facility, where the government was studying the program, or rather the algorithm, Dr. Zola had created for Hydra and that nearly had been responsible for the deaths of millions of innocent people, just because it had deemed them a threat to the organisation.

Of course, with the helicarriers gone, there wasn't really a risk of Hydra committing mass murder anytime soon, but while Ward didn't know what they wanted with the algorithm, he had instantly realised, as soon as he had been given the order, that this could be the one opportunity he had been waiting for.

If this algorithm had been able to identify threats to Hydra simply by analysing their history, then it surely would also be able to identify Hydra agents and their supporters, if given the right data. All he needed to do was to get his hands on the algorithm and find a computer expert willing and able to reprogram it.

To do all that, however, he first needed to get past the soldiers and scientists at the research facility standing in his way, men and women who were just doing their job, even fighting for the right side, but who could still sabotage his entire mission if he didn't manage to take them out.

Ward did his best to minimise casualties during their attack, even ordered the men under his command to use dendrotoxin grenades to take out as many of their opponents as possible, but in the end, his efforts weren't good enough. He realised too late that he had completely underestimated the scientists working on the project, who were apparently more than willing to destroy all of their research rather than to let it fall into the hands of Hydra.

Once they had broken through the facility's defences, his team keeping the last remnants of their opposition busy, Ward was making his way towards the computer lab, where the algorithm was being stored. He had expected it to be empty, as all the scientists should have been evacuated by now, but as he approached the large glass doors leading into the room, he spotted a young woman standing in front of one of the computers, typing on the keyboard furiously.

His expression darkened briefly in light of the unexpected obstacle, but as he was here on a mission, the specialist didn't hesitate to make the next move.

"Step away from the computer," he ordered calmly, his weapon drawn and aimed at the scientist, but at the sound of his voice, she suddenly spun around to him, grabbing a gun she must have had lying beside her and fired at him, forcing Ward to get into cover.

"Do you seriously think I'll let you take this? I know what Hydra tried to do with the algorithm the last time they got their hands on it, so you can bet I'm not going to let you get away with it."

As he didn't have any idea what exactly the woman was doing at the computer, Ward knew that he couldn't risk letting her continue. He was pressed for time and the fact that the scientist was armed didn't make the situation any easier, either.

His heart was beating loudly in his chest, as Ward knew exactly what he had to do now, even though a part of him was still fighting it desperately. A part of him that suddenly manifested in the form of an all too familiar voice right beside him, reminding him of the person he had always wanted to be.

"_You don't have to do this, Ward, there has to be another way."_ Given the insanity of his situation, the specialist wasn't even surprised that he could actually see Skye, or rather his memory of her, standing at his side, looking up at him with pleading eyes.

"_I know you, you're not a heartless killer, so please, don't shoot her." _She was looking so out of place in the almost sterile surrounding of the military facility with her blue flannel shirt and her soft brown locks falling over her shoulders.

Ward leaned his head back against the wall, closing his eyes tightly for a moment, hoping that the young woman would be gone once he opened them again, but to no avail. Skye was still standing there, trying to reach him.

"_I know what you're doing is important, but that woman is innocent. How can you claim that you're one of the good guys, Ward, if you kill innocent people for your mission?" _

At that point he actually smiled briefly – probably one more sign that he was slowly going insane – and turned to face Skye, his expression showing a mixture of guilt, sadness, but also acceptance.

"I… _don't_."

It were just two words, but somehow they were giving Ward a clarity about his mission, about himself, that he had been lacking so far. Until now he had kept telling himself that despite the horrible things he had done in order to infiltrate and at some point destroy Hydra, it wasn't affecting him as a person, that he could somehow still get out of this with his conscience, his _soul_, intact, but now he finally realised how wrong he had been.

If he wanted to fight monsters, he couldn't just pretend to be one, he had to actually become one in order to go through with the things he had to do. He would finish this mission whatever it would take, but at this moment he finally realised that for him, there would be no way back. Somehow, though, he didn't care.

His hallucination of Skye, or whatever it was, was still standing next to him, but she had fallen silent at his reply and remained that way as Ward suddenly leapt out of cover and turned back towards the lab. She didn't say another word and only watched as he shot the young scientist in the head without hesitation before she had a chance to destroy the algorithm.

_Ten._

**To be continued…**


	5. Chapter 5

**A/N: **I had written a first version of this chapter a while ago, back when we barely knew anything about Hydra at all. For the purpose of the story, I had decided to go with the notion that a small group of five people was leading the organisation and, well, as it turned out, I wasn't even that far off! I don't know how realistic it is to think that Ward wouldn't know about them, but for the sake of this fanfic let's just assume that the existence of Hydra's Heads isn't common knowledge, not even among their own people.

* * *

**Chapter 5**

Getting hold of the algorithm was a massive step forward in his fight against Hydra, Ward knew that, of course, but he still wasn't able to enjoy his success, not after what he had done to achieve it and after having seen his own conscience glaring daggers at him in the form of the woman he loved.

Once the mission at the military base was over, his hallucination of Skye was gone again, but the look of pure disappointment on her face stayed with him just as vividly as the sound of the gunshot that had ended the life of the scientist whose only mistake had been to be standing in his way.

The flight back to the Hydra base was mostly quiet, except from the occasional banter between the operatives who had been a part of the attack, congratulating each other on a successful job, while Ward remained almost entirely by himself, still too appalled by his own actions to want to have to fake gloating about them.

Once they had returned to their base, however, the jet landing in an underground hangar, the specialist knew that he had to push his true feelings down again and suppress his guilt in front of Garrett, who had come to greet them personally.

"Good job, boys!" the agent welcomed them with one of his typical grins plastered on his face. "I hear they put up a good fight," he began, only for Ward to finish his sentence immediately.

"But we fought better. Don't worry, we came across nothing we couldn't handle and I even brought you a souvenir." He held up the flash drive containing the algorithm, one of two copies he had made, with a carefree smile on his face, just as if he were still Garret's mindless follower, eager to please his boss.

The older agent even patted him on the shoulder as if he were praising a trained dog, reminding Ward once more of how manipulated he had been all those years without even realising it.

"Excellent, the guys upstairs will be very happy about this."

"'_Upstairs_', I thought you were upstairs?" Ward inquired casually as they started walking towards the elevator to get to Garrett's office, as always jumping at every opportunity to learn more about Hydra's hierarchy.

"Oh, trust me, son, I'm very high up, but you know how it is with these kinds of organisations; there's always someone a few steps above you," Garrett replied with a chuckle, obviously thinking nothing of his protégé's question. As he continued, his already light-hearted nature was further amplified by traces of the GH-formula's influence coming to the surface

"But honestly, who wants that kind of pressure, right? You and me, we're free spirits, we're not meant to be held down by firm structures and while I guess that we're doing pretty well here at the moment, I wouldn't even want to get a promotion. That's not the place the universe has intended for me. There are only six people in charge of Hydra, and even if they offered, I wouldn't want to be the seventh."

Six people leading all of Hydra. It was the first time Ward ever heard about them, and if Garrett had known the consequences of his passing remark, he would have put a bullet in his former rookie's head here and now.

But of course he didn't suspect a thing and Ward knew better than to push the subject.

"So, what does Hydra even want with that thing, now that the helicarriers are gone?" He looked at the flash drive now in Garrett's hand, a small frown on his face.

"Well, even if it's not as easy anymore to take our enemies out, it's still good to know who they are, don't you think?" his boss asked in return as he put the flashdrive carefully into one of his pockets. "And besides, that algorithm belongs to us. Dr. Zola was the one who created it and he used to work for the Red Skull himself, so I guess some people here at Hydra are pretty sentimental about it." He laughed loudly at that point, causing Ward to look at him in surprise just as they stepped into the elevator and he leaned over to push the button for the twentieth floor, where Garrett's office was located.

Noticing Ward's reaction, the older agent quickly elaborated.

"Oh, I was just thinking how much that actually reminds me of Phil with his bunch of SHIELD collectibles," he explained his reaction with an almost fond expression on his face. "You know, for his fortieth birthday I gave him this old walkie-talkie wristwatch that I had found in a pretty ancient SHIELD storage facility I had raided for Hydra, and for a moment there I actually thought he was going to have a heart attack. It was like seeing a kid on Christmas morning, he was so excited about it." Garrett shook his head slightly at the memory, a trace of nostalgia in his voice.

"Apparently they had only made twenty of those things, but honestly, if I'd known that, I probably wouldn't have given it to him. You know me, I'm not exactly the most careful guy, but I wouldn't have wanted to take the risk that he could have traced that damn watch back to the raid. Not that he did, of course, Phil probably never would have suspected me of working against SHIELD."

"At least not until you slipped up and blew your cover, right?" Ward replied with a smirk, trying to maintain a light-hearted conversation, even if just the mention of his old team made the guilt inside of him flare up again.

"Well, that makes two of us, doesn't it?" Garrett answered in return, alluding to Ward's mission to have Skye decrypt the hard drive with the team's data on it, and how he had almost screwed that up by being too careless.

A mistake the younger agent had vowed to himself never to make again.

"Alright, John, fair point, but that mission was going to blow my cover anyway and I still got it done, so in the end I guess it doesn't really matter how it happened." The doors of the elevator opened at that point, giving way to a brightly lit, extremely posh looking hallway.

Both agents stepped outside and headed towards Garrett's office, while Ward marvelled once again at how different this Hydra base was compared to what he had expected from a terrorist organisation supposedly on the run. However, he became focused again instantly as his former S.O. continued.

"I suppose you're right, though I still sometimes wonder why you left them all alive that day."

"I told you why I-", Ward quickly began to defend himself, only for Garrett to interrupt him immediately.

"Yes, yes, you explained why you didn't kill them, and believe me, I understand that. One last act of kindness to sever the bond, to cover any debts owed, but you have to forgive me if that still kind of bugged me. But, as it turns out, you actually might have done us all a favour, even when you failed to kill your scientist friends on the plane."

"I dumped them into the ocean," Ward retorted, doing his best to put a convincing scowl on his face at the memory, "how was I supposed to know that they would find a way to survive that?"

Garrett actually laughed briefly at this, obviously convinced that Ward had been trying his best to follow his orders and kill Fitz and Simmons when he had ejected the medical pod the two had been hiding in out of the plane.

As they reached the older agent's office, Garrett stepped inside first, allowing for the slightest flicker of uncertainty to pass over Ward's features as he was beginning to get worried about what his boss was talking about and what he meant by him doing Hydra a favour.

"It's alright, son, as I said, it was probably for the best. I'll admit I was angry when that kid almost took me out with that joybuzzer, but now I believe that it was all meant to be. Only that way did I become desperate enough to let Flowers inject me with that miracle drug and look at me now, I've found my place in the universe and I've never been better in my life."

Despite his years of undercover work, both for SHIELD and for Hydra, Ward couldn't recall a single instance where he had been more impressed with himself for managing to keep up appearances than he was right now for actually maintaining a completely straight face in light of Garrett's declaration, despite the million objections that were going through his mind at this point.

His former S.O. certainly didn't notice his deception, as he continued without missing a beat.

"But even if we leave all that aside, I'm convinced now that killing Agents Fitz and Simmons at the time would have been a mistake. They are far too valuable to simply take out, at least not without making them another offer."

Ward's insides were turning to ice at these words, but even if he already knew the answer, he still needed to ask, to be sure.

"John, what are you saying?"

"I'm saying that I want you to kidnap Fitz and Simmons so I can turn them into assets for Hydra. Well, and if they don't comply, I guess you'll get another chance to put them down after all."

**To be continued…**


	6. Chapter 6

**Chapter 6**

"_John, what are you saying?"_

"_I'm saying that I want you to kidnap Fitz and Simmons so I can turn them into assets for Hydra. Well, and if they don't comply, I guess you'll get another chance to put them down after all."_

For the second time within just a few moments, Ward had to muster up all of his training as an undercover operative to maintain his composure even in light of his new orders. He couldn't believe that Garrett wanted him to go after Fitz and Simmons again; not after everything he had already put the two scientists through.

"Why?" he finally asked, needing to know the true reason for his next assignment. "What's this really about? We've got tons of scientists here at Hydra, don't we? Don't tell me we actually _need_ those two."

"Oh, no, you're right, we don't," Garret replied with a wide smirk on his face as he walked over to his desk, "but _they_ do, so I want 'em!"

Three glass boards covered with the strange alien markings he had been working on the night before were still standing in the middle of the otherwise surprisingly tidy office, but Garrett simply walked around them, prompting Ward to follow him reluctantly.

"_They_?" the younger agent echoed as he crossed his arms in front of his chest, momentarily confused. He just stared at Garrett for a moment until he finally made the connection. "You mean SHIELD; that's why you want me to grab Fitz and Simmons, you want to piss off Coulson. You know that that's going to put us straight into his crosshairs again, don't you?" he wondered, even though he knew that this would hardly be a concern for his former S.O. After all, John Garrett had always lived for taking risks.

"Oh, please," Garrett scoffed, "Hydra's been in Phil's crosshairs ever since we came out into the open. And, well, especially, of course, once he found out that _you're_ one of us, too. Turns out, my old buddy's not really that good at handling betrayal," he pointed out with a chuckle, opening a small cabinet next to his desk in the process from which he pulled out a bottle of whiskey and two glasses. Meanwhile, Ward was wondering just how well the older agent would eventually take his betrayal himself until Garrett finally continued.

"I mean, sure, he and his little ragtag bunch of misfits are still busy trying to rebuild SHIELD, but so far they've already repeatedly messed up our operations, grabbed people we wanted to recruit before we could get to them and were just being a general nuisance. It's about time _we_ put _them_ back in our crosshairs."

"Okay, so I grab the scientists and then what?" Ward asked, doing his best to sound as much as his boss' ever faithful right-hand man as he could manage, all the while trying to find an angle on how to use this mission to his advantage.

He was already painfully aware that no matter what Garrett had planned for his former team mates, he would have to go through with his assignment, as he simply couldn't afford another failure without losing the older man's trust. It had been hard enough to convince him of his loyalty after sparing his team back at the Providence base and only the unlikelihood of Fitz and Simmons surviving being dropped into the ocean in a med-pod had spared him further scrutiny for not finishing them off once again. However, if he were to fail this job as well, and not go after them for real this time, it would become a far too obvious pattern for Garrett to ignore any longer.

Ward was still relieved that whomever he had contacted after ejecting the pod with the two scientists in it from the Bus had actually reached them quickly enough before they could have run out of oxygen or tried to reach the water surface on their own. As far as he knew, they had both only sustained minor injuries and were back to work for SHIELD, helping the rest of the team to rebuild the agency from scratch.

The specialist was watching his former S.O. closely as he waited for an answer, the older man busy pouring some of the expensive whiskey into the two glasses. He already wasn't liking the malicious smile on the older man's face, and that feeling only intensified when Garrett finally handed him one of the drinks, his eyes all but gleaming with anticipation.

"Then we let Coulson get angry. Make mistakes. He'll try to come at us with everything he's got while we'll be waiting for him, ready to pull the plug on his little revival project," he announced in his usual cheerful manner, before he lifted his glass and took a sip, obviously expecting the younger agent to do the same.

However, Ward just stared at the amber liquid for a moment in silence, the gears in his head beginning to turn as he was starting to see an opportunity to further advance his real mission. It was a risky move, he knew that, and far sooner than he would have expected as well, but then again he wasn't sure whether he would get an opportunity like this ever again.

"What?" Garrett finally asked, Ward's absent-minded behaviour obviously not lost on him. "Don't tell me you still have a problem with going against your team, because if you do –"

Ward never found out what the consequences in that case would have been, as he quickly interrupted his boss, not wanting to give him any reason to doubt his loyalty.

"No, don't worry, that's not it. You say they're getting in our way, I'll take care of them, no problem. Hell, I'll put a bullet in Coulson's head myself if you want me to, but honestly, if you really want to make him _mad_, there's a better way to do that then taking Fitz and Simmons. Take Skye!" he pointed out, causing Garrett to lower his drink for a moment and look at him with a raised eyebrow. The specialist quickly went on, trying to make his argument as convincing as possible.

"She's like a daughter to Coulson. I know he cares about everyone on his team, he probably even cared about me once, but for Skye he would go to the end of the world. She means _everything_ to him."

Garrett actually seemed somewhat intrigued by Ward's objection. He leaned against his desk and placed his glass somewhere on top of it, before he crossed his arms in front of his chest, scrutinising the younger man thoughtfully.

"And what about you, huh?" he asked, prompting a puzzled reaction from his former rookie.

"What do you mean?"

"Oh, I'm just wondering, what exactly does the girl mean to _you_?" There must have been at least a flicker of his true feelings passing over Ward's features at this point, as Garrett chuckled briefly before he continued. "Oh, come on, you can't fool me, son, I know exactly what all of this is about."

The specialist was obviously very well aware, that if his former S.O. had actually known what all of this was about, he would already be dead by now, but he still couldn't help but swallowed heavily at the assertion.

"You do, huh? Then why don't you enlighten me, John?"

"You want the girl for yourself, that's why you want to grab her, too. I'm just not sure what exactly your intentions with her are," the former SHIELD agent wondered, still looking at the younger man with an intense glare.

Ward cursed inwardly, afraid that his attachment to Skye was coming back to bite him in the ass now, right when he was getting so close to completing his mission.

The true reason for why he wanted to abduct the young woman as well, and not just the two scientists Garrett had planned for him to go after, was that he needed someone with her hacking skills to reprogram Hydra's algorithm and use it against the organisation itself. While seeing her again and revealing to her the truth about what he had been doing all this time was obviously a huge plus of this course of action, his feelings for his former rookie had – just this once – nothing to do with his intentions regarding her.

Obviously, though, he couldn't explain any of this to Garrett, so he quickly had to come up with a different story that involved neither his deep feelings for Skye, nor his impending betrayal, but was still more believable than simply denying his superior's observations.

"What, are you afraid they aren't honourable?" he ultimately replied jokingly, trying to steer his opponent as far away from the truth as he could, but clearly without much success.

"No, kind of the opposite actually," Garrett answered dryly, suddenly becoming noticeably more serious as the conversation was developing in a direction he apparently didn't like.

Ward knew he had to come up with something convincing, and fast, or he wouldn't get the opportunity to worry about any of his former friends anymore, as it would soon be his own life hanging in the balance instead.

Pretending that Skye didn't mean anything to him, that Garrett was wrong, was out of the question; his former S.O. simply knew him far too well for that. To tell him at least part of the truth, however, that he was genuinely in love with the young woman, wasn't an option either, as in that case the older man would know better than to let him anywhere near her ever again. Plus, that confession would also put Skye in a lot of danger, as Garrett would most likely consider her a weakness that had to be eliminated; a thought that was already sending a wave of dread down Ward's spine.

No, he had to come up with something else, something the Grant Ward Garrett still thought he was would say, and so he reached into the darkest parts of himself and finally managed to find the answer he had been looking for. The kind of thing his boss clearly wanted to hear.

"Okay, you got me, John. You're right. I wasn't lying when I said Skye was the perfect target to really tick Coulson off, but I wasn't being completely honest, either. I _do_ want her." He finished his drink in one gulp at this point, before he put the glass aside and crossed his arms in front of his chest as well, unconsciously mimicking his superior's position.

"Did you ever have that one toy as a kid you wanted more than anything else?" he asked, but continued without giving Garrett an opportunity to reply. "You kept thinking about it, you wanted to have it – you _needed_ to have it – and it was great when you finally got it, but then after a surprisingly short time, you just became… bored."

The older man's brow furrowed a little at this point, as he clearly wasn't entirely convinced yet.

"So that's what Skye is to you, a _toy_, nothing else?"

"You were the one who called her my 'candy crush', weren't you?" Ward pointed out quickly, trying to diffuse any doubt before it could manifest any further. "Skye's been in the back of my mind for a long time now and honestly, I want her gone, but the only way to do that is for me to _have_ her first. Let's just say, I want to play with her for a while, that way it's only a matter of time before I finally get bored of her."

The specialist had had many cover identities during his career and in all those years he had told more lies then he could remember, but this was the first time he actually felt physically sick from one of them. Just the thought of doing anything like that to Skye was… it was unbearable.

"So what do you say, John? You told me before that I could have whatever I want, and right now, I want _Skye_."

There was a huge grin on Garrett's face as he ultimately answered the question, his gaze filled with a mixture of pride and something Ward could only interpret as sadism.

"Then go and get her, son!"

**To be continued…**


	7. Chapter 7

**A/N: **I know my updates for this story are extremely short, but considering that I have two other AoS stories running ("So Long" is going to be updated again soon, don't worry!) I figured that's the only way I'll manage even halfway decent update speeds on any of them.

I'm so disappointed by how Ward turned out on the show, and although I'm still interested to see where his character goes next, it's definitely nice to look back at his S1 arc from time to time and imagine how different things could have been… *sigh*

* * *

**Chapter 7**

Coming up with a plan to lure SHIELD's science division out into the open had been far easier than Ward would have thought at first. In the end all he had needed to do was to think back to an operation that not only Coulson, but also Fitz, Simmons and Skye had been invested in, and then the answer had been quite obvious, actually.

Ian Quinn and his gravitonium.

Ward still felt like killing the sleazy businessmen every time he saw him for what he had done to Skye, but now Quinn's obsession with the gravity altering element was giving them the perfect opportunity to lay a trap for SHIELD none of the agents would see coming.

At Ward's suggestion, Garrett had all but dragged Quinn back into Hydra, demanding his help in taking another shot at SHIELD in exchange for getting to keep the gravitonium. Because what better bait was there than the element itself, or at least the illusion of it being somewhere out in the open, to provoke a swift response from Coulson and his best scientists?

In an effort to weaponise the gravitonium, Quinn had been increasing the strength of the miniature versions of his gravity field generator, allowing anyone to create powerful gravitational anomalies at will, using only a tiny amount of the rare material.

Thanks to Garrett's persuasive personality, Hydra was now in possession of several of the small devices and Ward and the team of soldiers assigned to him had used them to wreak havoc in an industrial complex not far from the area where they suspected the new SHIELD headquarters to be located. Now it was only a matter of time until Coulson's team would show up, ready to investigate, and the specialist would be waiting for them once they did.

"Any sign of them yet?" he asked over his radio once again, but still received the same answer as before. No, his old team hadn't been sighted yet.

He and a few of his men were waiting in a rundown maintenance building near the entrance of the complex, not far away from the place where they had tossed up a few cars and caused a massive gas truck to permanently levitate about twenty feet above ground in an effort to make a scene SHIELD couldn't ignore. They had also taken out all of the security guards from the night shift and replaced them with a few of their own guys, trying to maintain a low profile until the trap was ready to close.

Ward sighed heavily as he risked a brief glance out the window, before checking both his regular gun and his ICER once more, ready for any eventuality. The mission was obviously to take Fitz, Simmons and Skye alive, but as far as the rest of the team was concerned, all bets were off. He was going to give the order to retreat as soon as they had captured the two scientists and Skye, and he had told his own men to be extremely careful with their shots to not endanger their targets, but there was just no way that he could justify sparing any of the other SHIELD agents if the opportunity to take them down presented itself.

They obviously wouldn't open fire as soon as Coulson's people got into view to not compromise their carefully laid trap, but he had been in this business long enough to know that in the heat of the moment lots of things could go wrong and mess up the plan.

As a matter of fact, there was already one aspect to this mission that Ward had not anticipated earlier, although he probably should have. He briefly glanced to his side to check whether the unwanted distraction was still there and sighed once more as he found the hallucination of Skye that had already been haunting him during his last mission staring back at him just as she had been doing ever since he had arrived here.

She obviously took him giving her his attention as her cue and chose this moment to address him reproachfully.

"_So how do you think this plan of yours is going to work out, huh? Are you actually going to ask for my help – ask me to _trust_ you – right after you killed half of my team?"_

Ward had to admit, from all the things that could usually go wrong on a mission, having hallucinations of his former rookie once again was not something he had taken into account when he had been planning for this operation. He had thought – hoped, really – that him imagining Skye back at the military base before he had shot the young scientist there had been a one-time occurrence, but apparently he had been incredibly wrong.

Instead, Skye was once more standing next to him, leaning against the wall this time in a relaxed position, her arms crossed in front of her chest as she was staring back at him. She was still wearing the blue flannel shirt he had last seen her in, the same shirt she had worn when he had broken her heart as he had revealed himself to be a Hydra agent. This time she wasn't looking at him pleadingly, though, but instead with anger and disappointment in her eyes, which he knew was still far too tame compared to how the real Skye had to be feeling about him at the moment.

He was tempted to reply to her, arguing that he was doing everything he could to avoid casualties, but that his mission took precedence to everything else, including the lives of the people he had called 'friends' just a few months ago. As this Skye was part of his own mind, however, he knew perfectly well that he didn't even have to explain himself to her, that she already knew all these answers.

The main reason why he didn't say anything to her, though, was that talking to an imaginary person was most likely not the best way to behave on a mission with several other Hydra operatives nearby. He would probably have a rather hard time trying to explain that kind of behaviour to the other men in the room and the last thing he needed right now was any kind of negative attention from either his superiors or his subordinates alike.

Despite his resolution to ignore her, though, one of the aspects of this Skye that made her very close to the original, was obviously that she didn't do well with being ignored.

"_Oh, I get it, you don't want your Hydra buddies to find out about me. Sure, I mean, telling them that you're having hallucinations of the enemy is probably not the best way to build up the team spirit, right?"_ she asked almost jokingly, before continuing in a similar tone. _"Although, they were all pretty quick in accepting Garrett; but then again, if your organisation was founded by a guy calling himself the 'Red Skull', insanity is probably part of the job description,"_ she mused, finally straining Ward's patience to its limits.

"I'm going to check out the perimeter and make sure we haven't missed anything. Tell me once you have eyes on Coulson's people," he ordered one of his men before making his way out of the maintenance building and into the fresh night air outside.

He started to make his way along the side of the industrial complex, remaining in the shadows of the buildings to avoid detection by anyone, friend or foe, and once he had made sure that his radio was turned to receiving only, he finally addressed the young woman walking slowly by his side, despite his better judgement.

"I know you're not real, you're a hallucination, a figment of my imagination or whatever; you only look like Skye because I care about her. Just tell me what you want, alright, and then leave me the hell alone!" he ordered, not in the mood to deal with this issue any longer than he had to.

"_Aww, that's really sweet, Ward. Are you going to tell Skye how much you care about her _before_ or _after_ you start killing her friends?"_ the young woman asked in return, sounding alarmingly like the hacker herself.

Ward wasn't willing to play games at the moment, though, and so he stopped dead in his tracks to face both his hallucination and this entire problem head-on.

"You know what I'm doing here, what I'm trying to achieve, and you know just as well as I do that even if I have to kill someone from our old team, it will be worth it to take Hydra down," he insisted, his expression filled with frustration. "This is the kind of mission soldiers are willing to lay down their lives for, Skye; Coulson, May and the others, they would understand that." At this point Ward wasn't even sure anymore whom he was trying to convince; the imaginary young woman in front of him, himself or if he was subconsciously trying to figure out what he was going to say to the real Skye once he got the chance to tell her the truth.

He swallowed heavily before he continued, his voice calm and collected now, with just a hint of sadness underlying his confession. "I would die for this operation without hesitation if it would get the job done, but as much as I hate it, that's not how this works, alright? Believe me, I don't like it, either, but I'll do whatever is necessary to finish this, and you're not helping me by being a distraction or by trying to get me to stop and abandon my mission. So, _go. away_," he told the hallucination, emphasising each word as a sign that he was clearly fed up by her being around.

The look the young woman was giving him in return was far less amused than before, finally matching Ward's seriousness in light of the situation.

"_If you want me to leave, alright, but just remember that it's not really me – not _Skye_ – who is telling you these things, Ward, it's yourself! There is still a part of you that wants all of this to stop and that knows that the price is too high. You're just having me say it, because I'm someone you might actually listen to. But I guess for that it's going to take the real deal,"_ she pointed out before she suddenly disappeared, leaving the specialist all by himself.

However, it didn't take long for the silence to be disrupted once again, as Ward's radio came to life and one of his men finally delivered the message he had been waiting for.

"Sir, we have a breach in the perimeter. Two SHIELD vans have just entered the complex."

The specialist took a deep breath to calm himself for a moment, doing his best to focus once more after this latest encounter with his own conscience had thrown him off more than he liked to admit. When he finally answered, though, there was not even a trace of indecisiveness in his voice.

"I want to have full recon on Coulson's team ASAP. Be ready to move in as soon as I give the order, but until then, nobody attacks, understood?"

"Understood."

As Ward started to make his way back to the rest of his Hydra unit, there were countless thoughts and worries on his mind concerning this mission; how far he was willing to go for it and if there was even such a thing as 'too far' in this case, but the one thought that managed to drown out all the others, at least for a few moments, was a far more pleasant one.

He was going to see Skye again; the real deal this time.

**To be continued…**


	8. Chapter 8

**A/N: **Oh, Ward… *sigh*

* * *

**Chapter 8**

"What do you mean, Simmons isn't with them?" Ward asked the Hydra soldier standing next to him as he reached for the man's nightvision device to check for himself.

After having taken off alone for a moment to deal with his own conscience distracting him, the specialist had met up with a few of this men again who were positioned near the entrance to the loading area of the industrial complex where they had laid their trap for his former team.

The SHIELD agents, who had just arrived on the scene, were currently starting to try and figure out how two cars had managed to end up on the rooftop of the building next to them and why one of the trucks that had been parked there overnight was floating high up in the air in front of them. Ward had expected Fitz and Simmons to be leading the investigation as usual, but as he was taking a closer look for himself now, the female scientist was nowhere to be seen. He did, however, quickly identify several other familiar faces.

Agent May was obviously in charge of the team, which didn't really come as a surprise to Ward, considering that Coulson had been promoted to the new director of SHIELD after Fury's death and therefore wouldn't be going out into the field anymore. He knew that going up against the Cavalry wasn't going to be easy, but he had warned all of his men not to underestimate her and he wasn't going to make that mistake, either.

Staying close to May, listening to her instructions and following her orders was Skye, and Ward could feel his heartbeat going faster as he finally laid eyes on her again for the first time in months. Judging by her and May's interactions, he could tell that the specialist had taken over from him as Skye's S.O. and despite the small twinge of regret he felt at that thought, he was actually glad about it.

He wanted Skye to be prepared in the field, to be safe, no matter how laughable that sounded considering his plans for her tonight, and he knew that May was the best agent there was to train her.

The next two people he recognised were Fitz and Agent Triplett, who seemed to be working together at the moment, carrying equipment that was obviously going to be used to analyse the anomaly they had come to investigate. To Ward's immense relief, the scientist didn't seem to be suffering any after-effects from being dropped out of the Bus in a med-pod, and he could only hope that Simmons' apparent absence wasn't a sign that anything bad had happened to her.

There were three more people with the team, but Ward didn't recognise any of them and could only guess that Coulson had brought them in as support after the power shakeup following Hydra's reveal had thinned out his ranks. There was a woman with shoulder length brown hair and two men, one of whom appeared to be the driver, while the other was some clown in a leather jacket who seemed to be making far too many jokes judging even by the short time Ward was observing him and the others.

He briefly wondered if that guy was actually supposed to be his replacement on the team, before he forced himself to focus back on the current situation and the fact that one of his intended targets wasn't on site.

"Damn it, seven SHIELD agents confirmed, but no Simmons," Ward said out loud for the benefit of his men, but also let out a small sigh in relief without any of them noticing.

He was incredibly glad that this way he was going to avoid having to hurt the biochemist any further without actually acting against Garrett's orders. He still hated having to bring Fitz into Hydra and was doing his best to try not to think about what his former S.O. was going to do to the young engineer, but as Simmons wasn't with her team, there was simply nothing he could do about that.

"Alright," he finally declared, handing the night vision device back to his subordinate, "that means we have one less package to secure, but the plan remains the same. We'll separate all of them as soon as the diversion goes off, grab the two remaining targets and get out of here. We want to make this quick, so don't engage unless necessary. Once both packages are secured, I'm giving the order to retreat."

Ward briefly waited for all of his men to give a quick signal of acknowledgement, before he pulled out a small remote from his pocket and hit the switch on it without further hesitation, thereby deactivating the miniature gravity field generator that had been keeping the floating truck SHIELD had come to investigate up in the air.

They watched as the massive steel vehicle crashed to the ground, causing the agents around it to scramble away in a hurry. Luckily, none of them had been close enough to be injured by the truck's sudden fall, but it sure enough had managed to catch them entirely off guard.

"Now!" Ward ordered both over the radio and to the men beside him, before he took the lead himself, hurrying forward out of their hiding spot and towards the distracted SHIELD agents who were practically sitting ducks in the open loading area at the moment.

He was carrying his ICER right now, but before he had the chance to get a good shot, one of his men opened fire already, although missing his target. He did manage to alert the SHIELD team of their presence, however, and although Ward reacted by shouting at him angrily, he was inwardly thanking him instead, as he had probably avoided any casualties at this point by causing the agents to take cover.

The specialist could see that his former teammates split up into two groups, one consisting of Skye, May and Trip, while Fitz hurried into the other direction with the three new guys Ward didn't know by name. He knew, however, that they were heading right towards a dendrotoxin grenade he had personally installed there earlier, all but ensuring that taking in the scientist was going to go down without any fatalities.

He sent a few of his men to follow Fitz and the others, while he himself went after Skye, unwilling to leave her out of his sight again. He spotted her and her two companions vanishing around the corner of a building, but as he and his men were about to follow, he realised too late that the three SHIELD agents had just wanted to get into cover and were already waiting for them to get back into view.

They were at the back of one of the warehouses in the industrial complex, where several large dumpsters were giving the agents the perfect spot to hide out and take their attackers down without exposing themselves.

Ward only barely managed to duck and cover as the first bullets flew past him, but one of the Hydra soldiers following wasn't so lucky and went down, dead. The other two managed to find cover quickly enough, waiting for their superior's next orders. The specialist himself had returned back to the corner where they had come from, pressing himself against the wall to stay out of sight.

"This isn't how I wanted this to go down, Skye," he called out to his former rookie, knowing that she could hear him despite there being no answer. "You know, this isn't a kill mission, I'm not here to take you out, so if you surrender right now, I promise you that none of you has to die," he told her, the words all but catching in his throat.

"Shut up, Ward!" Agent May ultimately replied instead of the young hacker, causing a genuine grin to pass briefly over Ward's features. He had always admired her directness.

"Alright, suit yourself," he sighed while reaching into one of his pockets to pull out a small storing container. Inside of it was another of Ian Quinn's devices, a tiny gravity field generator just waiting to be activated, which he did right after throwing it towards the dumpsters the SHIELD agents were taking cover behind.

The two heavy metal containers were lifted into the air as if they weighed no more than a feather, and to Ward's stunned surprise, they weren't the only things affected by the gravity field. Agent May herself, who must have been standing too close to her cover, was lifted up unceremoniously as well, ending up about twenty feet in the air and losing her gun in the process. This only left Skye and Agent Triplett, who were now completely exposed, allowing Ward to shoot the latter with his ICER instantly. There had been far too many variables during this operation already, he didn't need any more.

With any distractions out of the way, Ward finally found himself face to face with his former rookie now, but while he obviously wasn't surprised by her reaction, to see the way she was looking at him was still more painful than he had expected. There was pure hatred in her eyes as she returned his gaze steadily, her gun pointed right at him, and in contrast to their last encounter, the specialist didn't have any doubt that this time she would be willing to pull the trigger.

"If Skye fires that gun, shoot May," Ward ordered his men in an almost lazy tone of voice, trying to make it seem as if he didn't consider the young woman a threat. He obviously did, but at the same time he knew that with her current S.O.'s life on the line, she wouldn't risk hurting him.

To emphasise his point, he actually holstered his own weapon, indicating for Skye to do the same.

"Come on, Skye, you don't want to hurt me, right?" he asked, despite knowing the answer all too well.

"How about you send away your men, then you'll see," she replied, the open threat hanging in the air for a moment, until Ward finally lost his patience. The longer this mission took, the bigger the risk was for Skye to find a way to escape, or to get hurt after all, and he simply couldn't afford either of those things.

"Put your weapon on the ground, now!" He ordered her in a tense tone and despite May's protests from above, Skye finally complied after a long moment, allowing Ward to send in his men to grab and restrain her. He didn't trust himself with the young woman right now, knowing that he might not be able to sell his allegiance to Hydra where she was concerned. Plus, there was something else he had to take care of, something he knew he couldn't avoid any longer.

He had spared his entire team's lives once before and had somehow managed to sell it to Garrett, but there was no way that he would get away with that again without at least losing the older man's trust or at worst even endangering his entire mission.

He had lost one of his own people today, now SHIELD would have to lose one of theirs.

**To be continued…**


	9. Chapter 9

**Chapter 9**

"Take her to the car," Ward ordered his men with a small nod towards Skye, knowing that he couldn't let her see this. If he was going to murder one of the people he respected most in the world, it was bad enough that he would have to look into _her_ eyes when he did it; he wouldn't be able to face Skye's reaction as well.

"Ward, what are you-" his former rookie started angrily, but before she managed to say anything more, the Hydra soldiers restraining her forced a piece of duct tape over her mouth, rendering her momentarily silent. They had been smart enough to cuff the young woman as soon as she had surrendered herself, but despite that impairment, she was beginning to put up quite a fight now that Ward seemed to be going back on his word and the men were clearly having trouble keeping her under control.

"Now!" Ward emphasised his order to his men, causing them to start dragging Skye away despite her best efforts to break free from them.

As soon as the specialist was sure that they were out of earshot and had vanished around the corner of the building next to them, he focused back on the scene in front of him. Agent Triplett was still lying on the ground unmoving and wasn't going to wake up any time soon, leaving him alone with Agent May. As Ward looked up towards her, he noticed that she had gathered her bearings again and seemed to be handling her gravity defying state quite well by now, despite still being utterly defenceless. At least she wasn't floating around aimlessly any longer, but instead had managed to return to a mostly upright position, from which she was now staring down at her former teammate with a stoic expression that could only barely conceal her anger.

"So, _not a kill mission_, huh? Not that I'm surprised, of course."

Ward shrugged briefly before he replied, pulling out his gun from its holster in the process.

"For what it's worth, I never wanted things to turn out this way. I was trying to avoid casualties today, but how would I report _this_ to Garrett," he indicated their surroundings with a small movement of his hands, "and explain to him why I didn't take the shot? Why I let the _Cavalry_ go when I had her right in my sight?"

One corner of May's mouth lifted ever so slightly at this, as if the specialist was actually amused by this answer.

"Do me a favour, Ward; if you're going to kill me, kill me, but stop hiding behind Garrett. You've made the choice to be here, at least have enough of a backbone to own it!"

Ward sighed, but ultimately nodded at the other agent's observation.

"You're right, of course, this is my choice. It's been mine from start and there's actually a pretty good reason for all this, one that I'd love nothing more than to explain to you – I _really_ would – but I just don't have the time for that. And it's not like it would make a difference anyway, considering what I'm about to do, right?"

"What are you talking about?" May asked in return, her brow furrowing slightly as she was obviously both confused and intrigued by Ward's unexpected response, but he completely ignored the question.

Instead he looked down at the gun in his hand, the metal object he usually was so comfortable with now feeling like nothing but a burden. However, as he was still adamant to go through with his mission, he knew that he didn't really have any other choice, and so he unlocked the safety and lifted the gun to aim it at his fellow specialist.

May, who had obviously given up on trying to keep the conversation going, was looking back at him with a steady gaze, not even a trace of fear in her expression. Despite his best efforts to approach this moment just like any other downright horrible thing he had done during his time undercover inside Hydra, Ward knew that he couldn't say the same about himself, that the look on his face was betraying how torn up he felt at the moment all too clearly.

While his hand was steady, his breath was catching in his throat as he was looking up at the defenceless woman, still hesitant to pull the trigger despite knowing what a powerful display of loyalty it would be for Hydra and what consequences not going through with this might have.

The truth was that no matter how much he was trying to handle this moment professionally, killing Agent May was personal and there was no point in trying to pretend it wasn't.

Obviously, Ward had no illusions that his fling with the other specialist had ever been about romance or any other feelings between them; it had always just been a means to an end. At first as a way to distract himself from the rage coursing through his body, then to keep himself from dwelling on his feelings for Skye and also to prevent the other agent from figuring out any part of the deception he had been playing on the team. Despite all that, however, he had always felt genuine respect for May and in a way even cared for her.

That was why the prospect of killing her right here and now was so utterly horrifying and why he wanted nothing more than to find another way. But how could he?

How could he possibly explain to Garrett that he had had Melinda May, SHIELD's infamous Cavalry right in front of him and had still failed to kill her? He had managed to get away with the excuse that he had owed his old team too much to kill them once before, he would not be able to do so again. He would lose Garrett's trust and Hydra's with it and that was simply not something he could afford.

"Any last words?" he finally asked as he took aim, his voice surprisingly soft and hesitant, given the situation.

"Yes," May replied back with a small scoff, still not showing any sign of being afraid, just like Ward had expected from her. "Go to hell!"

"Probably, yeah," Ward merely acknowledged her angry words with a small nod before adding, "I'm sorry," just as he was about to pull the trigger. Before he could actually do it, though, Skye's desperate voice behind him suddenly made him stop dead in his tracks.

"Ward, don't! _Please_!"

As the specialist turned around, he could see that the young woman had managed to escape the Hydra soldiers that had been restraining her so far and was hurrying back towards him now. The two men were coming back into sight a few seconds later as well, showing clear signs of a struggle. They were still holding their guns, but had obviously not dared to use them on the hacker as they were well aware of how important she was to their superior. Skye herself was still unarmed, but now that she had removed the tape from her mouth again, her words were the only thing she needed to stop Ward from taking the shot and not even the Hydra soldiers seizing her once more could keep her quiet this time.

"I don't know what you want with me, Ward," she kept imploring her former S.O. in a tense voice, now that she had gotten his attention, "but whatever it is, I will _never_ help you if you hurt May!"

This threat actually made Ward pause for a second as he realised that Skye was telling the truth. This was the reason why he had wanted to keep her away from this scene, but in the end his intentions regarding Agent May must have simply been far too obvious and he knew that he had only himself to blame for having to face Skye now, after all. But, what was done was done, and being angry at himself wasn't going to solve this problem. Somehow, he was going to have to come up with a solution that would keep his plan in motion and not turn any of the people he was depending on against him. And quick.

There was no question that keeping Garrett's trust was essential for his mission, but so was getting Skye's help. She was the most brilliant hacker he knew and he was well aware that he had no chance of taking Hydra down without someone with her skill set by his side.

Ward actually groaned slightly in frustration as he felt himself being torn in two directions at once, unable to decide which way to go. He had lowered his gun again by now, but still kept it firmly in his grasp, ready to pull the trigger at any moment.

Despite Skye's convincing argument, though, Agent May herself didn't seem particularly confident in her chances to convince Ward. Or even very supportive of her attempt, for that matter.

"Skye, don't waste your breath! You and I both know that he will not let me out of here alive, but whatever happens, you can _not_ co-operate with Hydra. That's an order!" May was entirely resolute, but her rookie completely ignored her and kept focusing on her former S.O. instead.

"Please, Ward! I know that everything you did during your time with our team was just to keep up your cover, but if there's any part of you that ever felt _anything_ for me at all, then _please_ don't do this!" The young woman was practically begging him by now to spare May, her desperation showing, but Ward actually let out a small chuckle in response.

He slowly felt his grip on the situation and even on himself slipping as the insanity of the moment threatened to overwhelm him, and for some reason, the thought that Skye didn't know how he really felt about her was suddenly even worse to him than the idea that she believed him to be Hydra. Ward knew that they had found themselves in impossible circumstances right now, but for a moment he still wished nothing more than that he could tell her…

… until he suddenly realised that he could!

It was a crazy idea and the specialist was well aware that Skye would hate him for this, at least for the moment, but he also hoped that it might just work as a way to spare Agent May's life.

"Of course I feel something for you, Skye," he pointed out as he looked straight at the hacker, turning the safety of his gun back on in the process. There was a look of complete surprise on the young woman's face, but for a moment he couldn't quite tell whether she was taking his confession in a positive or a negative way. As he continued, however, there was no doubt about it anymore.

"Why do you think I want to take you with me? Fitz is coming with us, because I have my orders. They actually included Simmons as well, but I guess it's her day off or something; lucky her. But you, Skye, you're just for me."

"For… for _you_?" the young agent echoed in reply, her eyes widening ever so slightly in horror and her voice filled with disgust at the implications of his words.

"Yeah. For the first time I actually want something for myself and that's _you_. So how about we make a deal, Skye? You come with me willingly and don't make any trouble and I'll let May and the others go."

"Skye, don't listen to him!" May's voice suddenly came from above, stern as ever, but with a noticeable hint of anxiousness in her voice, now that her rookie was involved.

Ward's respect for the older agent actually grew at this point as he realised just how much she cared about Skye, but obviously he couldn't let that feeling show.

"I could ICE you and the deal with Skye still stands, so unless you'd prefer to hang up there unconscious, I would stay out of this if I were you," he stated coldly, before focusing back on the young woman in front of him. "I know I haven't given you much reason to trust me recently, but I give you my word, nobody on your team gets hurt. The only thing I want in return, Skye, is you. That actually sounds like a pretty good deal to me, wouldn't you say?"

He extended his free hand to her at this point, his right one still holding his gun loosely, and waited for his former rookie to take it. He knew that exchanging May's life for Skye's compliance was a risky move that could easily get him into a lot of trouble with Garrett, but at least it was an explanation that he might manage to sell. The only thing he needed right now was for Skye to actually accept his offer, but going by the look on her face, she was having a hard time bringing herself to do so.

The young woman's expression was showing a level of repulsion Ward was finding hard to act indifferent towards. He knew of course that his entire former team was loathing him at the moment, that they were thinking of him as a traitor and that he was probably number one on their kill list – if Coulson was condoning such a thing – but to see the woman he loved looking at him with such hatred in her eyes was something else entirely.

He couldn't wait to finally be able to tell her the truth and he could only hope that by then it wouldn't be too late, that she would still believe him. Which would probably be much more likely if he hadn't shot her current S.O. right in front of her by then.

To Ward's immense relief, however, Skye finally seemed to have made up her mind as she now attempted to move forward, only to be stopped by the Hydra soldiers still holding her. The specialist gave the men a brief nod, indicating to them to let her go, upon which the young woman stepped forward at last and took his hand, her lips in a hard line as she was obviously doing her best to keep her composure.

"Trust me, you're making the right choice," Ward told her honestly, despite knowing that there was no way that Skye would believe him right now. She opened her mouth to respond with what he just knew would be a sarcastic comment, when one of his men suddenly spoke up, interrupting the moment.

"Sir."

However, the specialist barely paid any attention to him as he answered distractedly.

"Tell the others we're moving out. We got what we came for," Ward told the Hydra soldier without taking his eyes off Skye for even a moment. He was simply far too relieved about the outcome of their confrontation and to have the young woman with him for the moment to care about anything else.

The man didn't comply with his superior's command, though, as he apparently had something else on his mind.

"Sir, Garrett gave us specific orders in case there were no casualties on SHIELD's side during the mission."

"And what would those be?" Ward asked as he finally focused on the soldier, realising too late that the other man had his gun at the ready.

"He said he wants to send SHIELD a message and told us to make sure that they get it," the Hydra agent replied, before shooting his weapon at the unconscious figure lying on the ground without hesitation, causing all hell to break loose.

**To be continued…**


End file.
